Newberg-Dundee Bypass finally under construction as non-toll state highway

Updated October 1, 2013 at 4:37 PM;Posted July 30, 2013 at 3:40 PM

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Part of the LaDuke Construction team winds up a days work on the Newberg-Dundee Bypass. From left are Ed Worthylake (Medford), Richard Emery (Summer Lake) and Medford newlyweds Whitney LaDuke Butler and Robert Butler, who had been welding a repair on the cat and is wiping his brow.
(Terry Richard/The Oregonian)

Northwest Oregon's largest new state highway project in decades is under way, with 100 truckloads of dirt and rock being hauled daily at construction zones for the Newberg-Dundee Bypass.

Oregon Department of Transportation spokesman Lou Torres was unsure of the last new state highway project in the greater Portland area because it happened so long ago. It was probably the opening of Interstate 205 in East Portland in 1983, he said.

The Newberg-Dundee Bypass, which will be signed as an eastern extension of Oregon 18, has been discussed for more than two decades. Talk of the bypass had been going on for so long that local communities didn't believe it would happen, even after a formal groundbreaking late last year, according to Torres.

Skepticism disappeared when LaDuke Construction of Talent, a city near Medford, bid $8 million to win the initial contract for site preparation and began work a month ago.

Heavy truck traffic from construction can be expected at both ends of the bypass. For Newberg, that's near the intersection of Oregon 219 and Wilsonville Road; for Dundee, at the intersection of Oregon 99W and Parks Road.

The bypass will eliminate one of the biggest bottlenecks on the Oregon highway system by creating an alternate route to the two lanes of Oregon 99W that pass through the center of Dundee.

"It will get truck traffic and significant auto traffic out of Dundee and Newberg and give the downtowns back to the communities," Torres said.

View full sizeDan Aguayo/The Oregonian

The initial phase of the $262 million project will build a four-mile southern bypass of Newberg and Dundee. The road will be a controlled-access, two-lane expressway.

At full buildout, the bypass will be an 11-mile, four-lane expressway, with connections to Oregon 99W and extensions east of Newberg and west of Dundee. Future phases have been designed but need to be funded.

The first four-mile phase of the bypass, which will not charge tolls, is targeted to open in late summer of 2016. Earlier discussions about construction of a private toll road never amounted to anything, according to Torres.

"We've had this byway planned for a long time, awaiting funding," Torres said. "That came together when the 2009 Legislature passed the Jobs and Transportation Act."

Funding comes from state and federal highway sources, as well as from local communities, Yamhill County and the Confederated Tribes of the Grand Ronde.

Another highway project also broke ground this week, a $70 million rebuild of the main Interstate 5 interchange at Woodburn (exit 271). The three-year project will bring a second overpass, new lanes on Oregon 214 and 219, bike lanes, sidewalks and a transit center.